Judge clears the way for lawsuit against NCAA

Apr. 12, 2014
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Ed O'Bannon / Isaac Brekken, AP

by Steve Berkowitz, USA TODAY Sports

by Steve Berkowitz, USA TODAY Sports

A federal judge on Friday cleared the way for a trial in a lawsuit against the NCAA pertaining to the use of college athletes' names and likenesses.

The case could result in a ruling that ends the limits on what Bowl Subdivision football and Division I men's basketball players can receive as compensation in exchange for playing sports.

The lead plaintiff in the case is former UCLA basketball player Ed O'Bannon.

In a 48-page ruling, U.S. District Judge Claudia Wilken denied both the plaintiffs' and the NCAA's requests for full rulings in their favor without trial.

The ruling said a jury trial will begin on June 9.

While setting the stage for the trial, Wilken denied a request from the plaintiffs that she reconsider her decision not to grant class-action certification to a broad range of current and former athletes seeking monetary damages from past live television broadcasts of games. That will prevent the plaintiffs from seeking an award that could have been in the billions of dollars.

However, absent a settlement, the trial will include efforts by at least some of the roughly 20 named plaintiffs to obtain individual monetary damages awards. If successful, that could open the door to lawsuits from other individual current and former athletes.

Wilken's ruling handed another small victory to the plaintiffs. She ruled that at the trial, the NCAA cannot use one of the five justifications it had been hoping to offer as a reason for its limits on what athletes can receive for playing college sports. She said that the NCAA cannot say that the limits enable increased support for women's sports and less prominent men's sports.

"We have confidence in the legal merits of our case and look forward to presenting it at trial," NCAA chief legal officer Donald Remy said in a statement. "We are evaluating our legal options with respect to the decision. The model we have today enables nearly half a million student-athletes at over a thousand schools to compete on the playing field while getting a college degree.

"The NCAA disagrees with the (judge's) decision that it is a not a legitimate justification for the NCAA to look out for the interests of women's sports and other men's sports. The NCAA values and prioritizes all of its student-athletes regardless of whether their sport brings in revenue. The NCAA and member schools are committed to addressing areas for improvement in the current system, but efforts to twist legitimate concerns about the current system into a rationale for paying student-athletes would do far more harm than good and would severely diminish the opportunities for academic and athletic achievement student-athletes benefit from today."

Wilken also handed the NCAA some requirements if it wants to use two other of the five justifications it has offered for the its limit on athlete compensation:

--The limit promotes the integration of education and athletics because it keeps athletes from being treated markedly differently from other students for their participation in an extra-curricular activity. The NCAA had presented a set of statements from several university officials to that effect, but Wilken rejected those, saying that that if the NCAA wants to make this argument at trial "it must present evidence to show that (the limit) actually contributes to the integration of education and athletics" and it must show this integration enhances competition among the schools.

--The limit promotes competitive balance among the schools in Bowl Subdivision football and Division I men's basketball. Wilken wrote that the NCAA has "presented some evidence that the (limit) promotes competitive balance" but added that in order to prevail on this at trial, the NCAA "will have to present evidence that the (limit) promotes a level of competitive balance that (1) contributes to consumer demand for Division I football and basketball and (2) could not be achieved through less restrictive means."

In addition, Wilken's ruling appears to take issue with the NCAA's argument that the plaintiffs have no ability to demand compensation for appearing in live television broadcasts because the First Amendment protects these broadcasts as a form of non-commercial speech.

While rejecting the plaintiffs' argument that live game broadcasts are commercial speech, she wrote that the question of whether college athletes "hold any ownership rights in their athletic performances does not depend on the scope of broadcasters' First Amendment rights but, rather, on whether the student-athletes themselves validly transferred their rights of publicity to another party. Because the current record does not demonstrate that all Division I student-athletes validly transferred all of these rights, the First Amendment does not preclude student-athletes from asserting rights of publicity in live broadcasts or re-broadcasts of entire games."